Public Record Text Message (March) Get Informed Here! >> This article details a law concerning the use of data for official purposes and describes if it is right.
Public Record Text Message has been in the news for a few years. It has caught the public’s attention, who are curious to know what exactly does it mean and will their privacy be intruded on or not. However, this has led to a lot of confusion with people thronging the internet to know its consequences.
We, in this article, have tried to shed on what does having text messages on public record mean and what are the measures and laws passed by different states of the United States. For this, please ensure to read the article till the end.
Table of Contents
What does Public Record Text Message Mean?
Each of the 50 states in the United States requires government agencies to gather and preserve external and internal communications concerned with the government business. Herein, it is collected to ensure the agencies can produce the documents to satisfy the requests on public records or to keep up e-discovery investigations and events.
It includes all the electronic communication channels used by government agencies to liaise which has been consequently moved by most states opposing the inclusion of electronic communication and data including the Public Record Text Message under the sunshine local laws.
What are Sunshine Laws?
The Government first initiated the Sunshine Law in the Sunshine Act in 1976. Furthermore, the law encompasses the regulations requiring disclosure and transparency in either government or business.
As per the Sunshine law, it makes all the government records in the form of video, audio recordings, text messages, and the data of text message available to the public. Furthermore, many states have moved to include electronic communications and text messages under the Sunshine law that ensures open and ethical conduct.
Are Text Messages part of Public Record?
The official laws tend to vary for each jurisdiction; however, Public Record Text Message makes a part of the public records. Each state requires to keep a record of all the electronic messages that are sent from government-issued devices in addition to government communications that are sent from privately owned devices. As per law, all these are treated as public records.
However, the government is yet to implement a defined solution for capturing and retaining text messages and the content held responsible in court if any employee sends or contains official business data.
Conclusion – Storing and compliance of Text Messages
The retention of Public Record Text Message still needs to be had an improvement. It includes insufficient availability of data considering the process to be conducted manually and is time consuming. However, the records’ availability does play an important role when it comes to cross-checking or proving the sharing of government-related information.
What are your views about capturing electronic communication shared by government agencies? Do you think it is right to capture text messages and other information for records? We do like to know your opinion. Please do share with us in the comments box below.
